Galactic Nexus/Episode 5: Arboreal Discord I
This episode is unnamed for now. Aether will rename it when it is finished. Story so far "As inscribed in the prophecy, a young man named Frisch Celerent walks on a path where the future of being the ruler of time and space, the Harvester, awaits him. There was an intrusion in the facility, and it resulted to a power outage. But Master Altus was keen enough to use his gift of perfect sight to locate the perpetrator. As soon as they cornered them... It was a lady in her twenties. Master's group decided to surround her with good intentions but a striking lack of discernment, what with Verzleinir weakening their body and mind. And that was when a schism formed between us and the others. How will they prepare to stop the Hollow Empress if the schism is still among us? Such marks the fourth page of the history of the Harvester in another realm." — Irissia Roleplay Jack, Patricia & Layla are seen recollecting themselves while trying to train the body & Mind, trying to recenter themselves as soon as possible, which is a difficult task at first, but must complete their training in order to ensure Planet Mobius's survival against the Hollow Empress. While the Mobians were having their private time back at the headquarters, Frisch, Seele, and Julia were having a conversation back at camp. "Sorry for the crapshow back there. I think it kinda scared you..." Seele apologized to Julia for her sudden erratic behavior. Julia would be glancing down at the ground with her hands still clamped together on her upper chest. Upon hearing Seele, she'd glance up at her nervously. "O-Oh, u-um, it-it-it's okay... I-I-I don't think yo-you meant to-to..." she said, accepting said apology. Seele let out a hearty smile. Deep down, she was concerned about Julia, which is why she did not want her to feel trapped back at the headquarters by not joining in what the group just did. But it just seems she hates it when people just can't take a hint and show off just how much they care without actually discerning. That drama was unavoidable to the drama queen—they made the sparks to make the fire and she added fuel to it. "... Anyway... Correct me if I'm wrong, but did you really emerge from a closet in the facility?" Frisch asked Julia. Julia caught a glimpse of her hearty smile, but couldn't help but avert her head and eyes away out of sheer shyness. Though they'd soon face Frisch upon him asking his question. "Th-That was a-a-a closet? I-I-I thought i-i-it was a s-small storage s-space... bu-bu-but yeah... I-I don't know h-h-how I got i-in there at all. I-I just s-sort of woke up in-in there," she answered his question. "She woke up in there...?!" Seele thought. "Frisch, is it just me or I think the anomaly is getting weirder?" "... Waking up in such a space is peculiar, yes," Frisch affirmed. "But the possibility of the anomaly causing it... it is likely, judging from her clothing. I presume you are from a distant world, is that correct?" "A-A-Anomaly?" Julia asked with raised eyebrows. She didn't know what this anomaly was kind of put her in suspense, since she didn't know what they were talking about. "Di-Distant world? Wh-Wh-What world are we o-on now?" "The dummies say we are currently on Mobius," Seele answered. Wow. She couldn't get over how she thinks that the others are stupid. "Mo-Mobius? U-U-Uh... um-um... I-I've never he-heard of a place c-called that... ar... ar-are we still in M-Moros Latex?" she asked, getting increasingly nervous. "... I don't think so. The anthropomorphs never mentioned anything like that, and I doubt they've heard about it. Which proves... you have been sent here by the anomaly." "We-We're not in... we-we-we're not in..." Julia muttered to herself, and had averted her head down to the ground. If Frisch or Seele noticed, they can see that she was slowly beginning to tremble. Uh oh, that can't be a good sign. "Uh... Julia? Are you okay?" Seele asked in a concerned tone. Frisch was currently observing her behavior in order to determine how he could deal with her properly. If the two observed closely, they could notice her chest was almost convulsing, implying she was breathing at an abnormal rate. Not only that, but it looked like she was starting to lose her balance, and although they probably couldn't notice, her heart rate increased drastically. These were the signs of the beginning of a panic attack, or one in progress. But what was the cause? "... Tch, a panic attack. Elainne, respiration." Seele nodded as she stood up and kept her distance from Julia while muttering something inaudible from a meter in front of her. Frisch, on the other hand, tried to give her a comfortable sitting position. "... We're here for you. Please close your eyes and take deep breaths. Inhale, exhale..." From Seele emerged calm, cool breezes that bathed Julia in an attempt to stabilize her respiration. There was a strange yet fragrant scent mingling with it—the scent of lavender. Julia was put into a comfortable sitting position by Frisch, while she felt cool breezes with a scent of lavender. The former helped a bit in general, but neither didn't stop the shaking, and the latter only helped a small bit. It was due that she didn't heed Frisch's advice to take deep breaths, and thus couldn't calm down. She couldn't focus enough to do so, which meant the cause was probably an internal one. Frisch examined her heartbeat, pretty much confirming she has tachycardia—a symptom of a panic attack, like hyperventilation. "... Elainne, she's unresponsive," Frisch described her condition to Seele. "... This might be an internal problem." Seele nodded in affirmation as she focused on the state of Julia's soul with Ether Vision, allowing her to sense any acute psychological anomalies. The breezes she was producing were now getting more spiritually therapeutic in nature. This was grounded in the attempt of stabilizing her psychological condition via the breezes carrying spiritual waves of positive amplitude emitted by Seele herself. Since she is keeping track of Julia's current psychological state, she made sure that the waves she emitted were uniform so that Julia's negativity would be attenuated enough for her to focus. Seele's ultimate goal at the moment was to help Julia focus and return to her senses. If this does not help her at all, what will? While it did take a bit of time for the breezes of spiritual waves to take into effect, they did eventually begin to calm her down a little. Her breathing slowed down enough to where her hyperventilating had ceased, though even then she was still breathing just a little bit fast. She also stopped trembling, and was thus able to focus without the gist of the panic attack overwhelming her mind. She'd glance down at the ground while still sitting down, now embarrassed. "...S-S-Sorry... a-about th-that..." she said. "... Fear no more," Frisch reassured her as she rubbed her back. "... We are here for you." "Good to have you back!" Seele perked up to get the positive mood going. "We'll be helping you cope with it from now on. You can count on us." Seele pat Julia's head gently—a reward for thr latter's success of retrieving her focus. Julia's eyelids seemed to have lowered a bit from the backrubs, and she'd glanced up at the two when Seele perked up. "...Th-Thank you... b-b-both of you..." she said, making an internal effort to smile, though all that was there was just her signature shy look. She'd notice Seele's hand reach out for her and wondered what she was going to do. When the pats came, her brows raised quite a bit for a second before lowering... along with her eyelids... wait a minute, did she like that? Seele noticed her reaction and caressed her head in glee. "There, there..." Julia couldn't help but raise her head a bit with Seele caressing her head. Seele could notice her cheeks got a bit red, but yet she had a small shy smile on her face too. Awww, how wholesomely cute. Seele let out a soft chuckle. "Glad you like it." ---- Meanwhile, at a distance near the woods of a forest, there is a battalion of strong robotic humanoid foot soldiers with Mohawks & wearing camo singlets, pants, combat boots & gloves that are known as "Jack-4 Robots", created by a tall one eye Green mad doctor leader & strategist with antennas, with a blue jacket with green buttons & sleeves, black pants & Boots named "Dr. EggPlankton", along with 4 smaller & skinny robots with claw hands, one red intellectual robot named "Redbot", one Yellow defensive robot named "Yellowbot", one Green wildcard named "Greenbot" & one Dark blue lackey support named "Bluebot". Along with the mad doctor are an orange metallic robot version of Jack named "Metal Jack", a more titanium & chrome skinned Jack-4 Commander with the same name & next is a bald headed Vulture with a pink face, white feathers on the head, black beak & black feathers on the body & arms, wearing black shades, collar, white shirt, brown gloves, black jacket, pants, metal boots, who is named "Vulcan the Vulture", a mad genius & technology specialist. And finally a Black & Blue Crocodile with Black scales, blue muzzle, belly & arms & Green spine back, wearing gloves, spiked bracelets & Boots with medium armour, a leader of a group of crocodile bandits from Patricia's past, his name is Archer the Crocodile. And right now, this band of villains of the EggPlankton Empire is currently running an investigation on strange occurances that have been happening around lately. "Ok everyone, listen up. We've got strange readings coming from these precise locations. Today, it be a seek & destroy mission. We don't know what's out there or how powerful these levels really are, so we're going in blind. Be on guard." Said Dr. EggPlankton, leading the charge, sending out his battalion of Jack-4 Robots out on a seek-and-destroy search party to find out where these readings are coming from, while a Jack-4 Commander & Metal Jack also scouts out the area for any sightings. "Can you believe that we've been selected, even hired by EggPlankton himself to do the dirty jobs? My Crocs & I are itching to search & take down on what we can find!" said Archer while becoming excited a more aggressive tone. Vulcan sighed as he is less than enthusiastic & also self defensive about this whole ordeal & then he asked "Why is it always this time of year we get dangerous assignments like this?" A small ways away, things were quiet, rather.. It seemed so very wrong, animals steered clear of this particular spot and the air itself seemed unusually still, not a sound could be heard in this area. All was well, until a sound very reminiscent of a zip-lock bag resonated in the clearing, with one individual being deposited from what looked like a tear. With the man standing up, the tear itself sealed before he could even react, leaving whoever it was stranded without any hope of return to wherever he came from. This man was named Locar Du-Mas, someone who fought for peace in his land using methods that were arguably evil, even going on to acquire the vessel containing one half of a chaotic entity as a symbol of his authority. Currently he was using this symbol, a finely carved wooden staff with a golden bust of a cobra coiling around the top section of the staff, its head poking upwards like it was ready to strike.. For it's eyes, two emeralds were slotted where the eyes should be. Locar himself was an aging individual weighing in at 157 Ibs and clocking a height of 6'1"; further more his face was set in a rather confused grimace. Those serpentine yellow eyes of his flickering back and forth in confusion for a moment, before he ran a hand through what looked like shortened black hair that started to grey at the ends. His attire was simple, a crystal-steel gambeson with a few metals resting neatly atop the upper left side of his gambeson, with a velvet cape on the right side; followed by what looked like crystal-steel gauntlets and greaves. Wrapped around his head was a white cloth of sorts, as he was last seen traversing through a desert region of his home territory. However, with such a temperate climate, he undid the wrap around his head and began to wrap it around his neck like some sort of scarf. After some time spent looking at his surroundings, Locar decided it would have been best to just start walking in a direction and hope to meet someone; not like he had any clue what was going on.. Regardless, he kept his staff at the ready, no doubt some unruly beast might try and ambush him for all he knew, better to be prepared. Several yards away from the battalion stood a particular tree with sturdy branches in the middle of a bushy grove. Keenly observing the robots from that tree were a pair of crimson irides. It came from a masculine figure with unkempt ashen brown hair, wearing some sort of charcoal-black light armor with crevices faintly glowing orange due to spiritual heat—radiation exuded into the spirit realm instead of the material plane. "First, I ended up here for some reason; second, similar draconic signatures nearby; third, a junkyard with... Uh..." He glanced at Dr. EggPlankton and his organic accomplices from the tree. "Some weird-looking... thing... And animals standing on two feet... Why am I even seeing this...? Anyway, I have to get to Frisch, and fast...! ... Wherever he is." Now, odds are after a long ass period of wandering; Locar might have encountered at least someone, maybe even coming across Dr. EggPlankton and his accomplices.. All the while grumbling about how he wasn't used to traversing temperate regions. A dark, sinister laughter is heard from behind them as it draws closer to the group, "It would appear that my invitation to his meet up was lost. Not to worry," a "man" with firey orange hair with half his face clawed off walks in a slitted pupil staring daggers at them, "For I, Vorkata Everburn, have arrived." Serpina slithers in with a hiss and extending her Cobra hood, it is evident that she is not in a talkative mood. Dr. EggPlankton, Archer, Vulcan, HenchCombats, Metal Jack & Jack-4 Commander turn to the sound of the hissing, surprised & shocked to see Vorkata Everburn & Serpina arrive to join them. "Everburn? What are you & your lovely accomplice doing here?" asked EggPlankton who had a surprised look on his face. "Who the actual heck is Everburn?" asked Vulcan who was a bit scared, thou does his best to stay intimidating, unlike Archer who is doing his best to stay brave. "Yeah, who's he?" Archer also asked with confusion & a bit of fright. "He was one of Darkstorm's enemies long ago from what I've heard. But back to he subject on hand." said EggPlankton while still wondering on what Everburn & Serpina are doing here during their investigations. Everburn somewhat smirks and walks to Archer, "Since you were not told I shall inform, I am the Clone of Darkstorm himself," he says while circling him, "Serpina is the Queen of the Naga Homeworld." Locar couldn't help but smile widely, raising a hand and pointing a finger at the assembled group and the newcomers. His expression detailed a sense of mirth; like he had been told a joke that only he would get. "My my, I would never have expected to see people and creatures quite as interesting as you..? Pray tell, may I ask you something, do you think you can enlighten me as to where I am..? I'm unfortunately lost and the assistance would be most appreciated~" Anyone here